


Soft

by Steadfxst



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Crying, Enemies to Friends, Episode Related, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-03-13 11:18:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13569489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steadfxst/pseuds/Steadfxst
Summary: Based on 2x08: "Leap to Faith"Everyone else has called it a night. With just Michael there with her, Eleanor finally allows herself to cry. Michael comforts her.





	Soft

Their escape plan is mere hours away, and everyone else was already in bed. It was just the two of them on the picnic blanket now.

“Michael, I’m scared,” Eleanor admits.

“Oh, Eleanor…”

Before he quite knows what’s happening, she’s sitting between his out-stretched legs and wrapping her arms around him. She buries her face into his chest. Reflexively, he reciprocates, and it registers somewhere within him that this is the second time he’s given and received a hug from Eleanor today. It's his second hug _ever_ , actually.

Before he can begin to process this, he hears a sharp inhale of breath come from somewhere below his chin, under which her head was tucked.

“Eleanor?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. It’s nothing.”

He pulls away just enough to look at her. Her cheeks were streaked with tears.

“Well that doesn’t _look_ like nothing.”

Michael rummages around in his pocket until he pulls out a handkerchief. At the time, he’d thought it was just another useless human artifact, but now he understands. Carefully he dabs at her eyes. She gives a small smile.

“Thank you,” she says. “Who knew you, of all beings, would be so prepared and so chivalrous? You’re just a big, ol’ softy.”

“I resent that!”

She gives a watery laugh.

“You totally are. Only chivalrous guys give super long hugs and dry ladies’ tears. If you weren’t a softy, you’d be trying to take advantage of me.”

Michael frowns.

“Is that what they do on earth? I mean, I knew they did, but it can’t have been all of them, right?”

Eleanor doesn’t answer right away.

“Maybe it was just the ones I knew.”

She shrugs and rests her head back on his chest. She wraps her tiny, human hands around the excess fabric at his waist like a child holding a blanket. He suddenly gets the impulse to stroke her hair; he gives in.

“I’m sorry, Eleanor.”

“It’s not your fault.” She picks her head up. “Wait, it wasn’t your fault was it?”

“ _No._ ”

“Good.”

Michael’s not sure how long they sit like that, just the two of them, Eleanor curled up in his lap like a cat. At one point, she folds the blanket’s edges up around her, and Michael knows she’s asleep when he hears a gentle snore. He doesn’t want to wake her, but she needed to go back home. To her bed. To Chidi. Hell, maybe even Chidi’s bed.

“Eleanor?” he murmurs.

“Yeah?” she husks.

“You should go home,” he says.

“I’m not tired,” she says.

He rubs her shoulder.

“We have a long day ahead of us. You should go to sleep. In a bed.”

She sighs.

“Okay, Michael.”

Reluctantly, she stands, stretches, and cracks her joints. She looks disheveled but sweet. Michael doesn’t think she’s ever looked fresher. He wonders if she was ever this content on earth.

Michael stands up after a moment. His legs are stiff, but he doesn’t mind. Not when Eleanor’s giving him a sleepy smile.

“Thanks, Michael. I owe you.”

“You don’t owe me anything, Eleanor. You just worry about tomorrow. Or better yet, leave the worrying to me.”

She gives him a wave as she stumbles back to her house.

Michael was getting very good about doing enough worrying for all of them.


End file.
